Closing the Meal Gap Act of 2025
Closing the Meal Gap Act of 2025 would overhaul how SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits are calculated and managed. The core change is to base monthly benefits on the cost of a new “low-cost food plan” rather than the current thrifty plan, using a defined 4-person baseline household and adjusting prices for household size, geography (Hawaii and Alaska), and monthly price changes. The bill also increases the value used to determine benefits, expands deductions (notably a new standard medical expense deduction and the removal of a cap on excess shelter expenses), eliminates the time limit on benefits for able-bodied adults without dependents, and makes a set of conforming administrative changes to reflect the new system. Overall, the bill aims to raise and stabilize SNAP benefits, broaden eligibility in practice (by removing the time limit), and simplify/modernize benefit calculations. Key design features include: a fixed, reevaluated low-cost diet basis (with periodic updates and geographic adjustments), a higher allotment percentage using that plan, expanded medical and shelter deductions, and the removal of the ABWD time limit. The changes would affect most SNAP participants, with particular impact for families with children and for residents of Alaska and Hawaii, as well as for SNAP administering agencies and states that implement these rules.
Key Points
- 1Define and use a Low-Cost Food Plan for benefit calculations
- 2- Replaces the current thrifty food plan as the basis for SNAP benefits.
- 3- Sets a four-person baseline (man 19–50, woman 19–50, child 6–8, child 9–11) and requires reevaluation of the plan by Dec 31, 2031, and every five years thereafter.
- 4- Costs are used to determine uniform allotments, with adjustments for household size (economies of scale), Hawaii, and urban/rural Alaska costs; annual cost updates every Oct 1 using the preceding June data and rounding down by household size.
- 5Increase in value and geographic adjustments
- 6- The value of SNAP allotments would be tied to the low-cost plan, with the policy changing the calculation from the prior “thrifty plan” basis.
- 7- The statutory percentage used in the calculation increases from 8% to 10%.
- 8Expanded deductions and removal of shelter cap
- 9- Adds a Standard Medical Expense Deduction: a flat amount (starting at $140 in FY2025) indexed annually to CPI for medical care, with an option for higher deductions if cost-neutral.
- 10- Eliminates the cap on Excess Shelter Expenses, expanding how much households can deduct for shelter costs.
- 11Elimination of the time limit on benefits for able-bodied adults without dependents (ABWD)
- 12- Removes the subsection that imposed a 3-month time limit for ABWD to receive SNAP benefits, effectively making eligibility unlimited as long as other requirements are met.
- 13- Requires conforming amendments across related program sections to reflect the removal.
- 14Administrative and budgetary adjustments
- 15- Replaces references to the thrifty plan with the low-cost plan across the statute and adjusts related sections accordingly.
- 16- Establishes initial and subsequent Quality Control (QC) funding tied to the new plan (with FY2025 funding not to exceed $50 million and FY2026 funding adjusted to reflect the difference between old and new plans).
- 17- Includes several conforming amendments to cross-references and related statutory sections to align with the new 3(n) numbering and other renumberings.